On Tuesday, a court of appeals in California rejected Google Inc.’s attempt to get a privacy lawsuit against them dismissed. Street View Maps is part of Google’s “maps” product that offers 360 panoramic viewing and street level imagery. But according to the plaintiffs involved in the lawsuit, Google collected more than just photographs while capturing the “inhabited world”.  They collected email, passwords, personal images and other information from unencrypted home computer networks, a process which involves intercepting and decoding the data. Google’s defense: the information was “readily accessible to the general public.” Well, the California Court system is not sympathetic to their plea and the suit will proceed, possibly leading to serious monetary repercussions for even a company of Google’s size. Considering the amount of press and controversy online privacy has received in the U.S. of late, the public is informing Google and it’s peers that this sort of unethical invasion of privacy will not be tolerated. Google was also recently connected with In the age of technology, IT companies must learn, and fast, that the ethical standards in business apply to all forms of communication and that sometimes all the money in the world can’t cover up bad ethics.